Munnar

Fort Cochin

Fort Cochin

Munnar at sunrise

At the top of the mountain!

Breakfast on the mountain

Cycling around Fort Cochin was so much fun! We got to know the area pretty well, and were able to see a lot more by bike. It really is a lovely town, with lots of pretty old French/Spanish/Dutch houses, some with courtyards and pretty gardens with restaurants. We took our bikes on the ferry over to Vipin Island, thinking that we could cycle to the beach but unfortunately it turned out to be 25km away so we had to get a bus. It was not fun. It was heaving with people to hanging-out-the-door point and it flew around the corners. We hung on for dear life and hoped that every next stop would be ours! Anyway, turned out to be a complete waste of time as it was just a big beach but full of Indians so felt very uncomfortable in bikinis. I would rather have chilled out in a nice cafe back in Fort Cochin! Ah well, we're bound to make mistakes along the way.

We wanted to go to Hampi the following day but the trains were full until tonight, so we booked that and decided to head up to Munnar for 1 night. What a good decision!! Munnar is absolutely beautiful. Only about 4 hours from Cochin, it's a completely different place full of lush greenery, huge forests and up in the mountains the hills are full of tea plantations which were planted by the British from 1880. This morning we went on a morning trek from 6:30am with 3 other travellers who were really nice. The trek took us through the tea plantations, then up a mountain of 2,100 metres. It took 3 hours to walk up, but when we reached the top it was absolutely stunning. You can see across miles of the mountainous region, and we were so high you could see the top of the clouds! We stopped for breakfast there and it was the best picnic spot I've ever been to! It took 3 hours to get back down then it was time to head back to Cochin, where we're getting a sleeper train to Mangalore, then a bus to Hampi. Really looking forward to seeing Hampi!! xx